The Perseus Complex
by rvr idtq
Summary: Percy Weasley is chosen to be the guinea pig for Voldemort's newest project- an untested experiment on the subconscious that will either destroy him or turn him to the dark side.
1. Prologue

The Perseus Complex

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A/N: This is the new and hopefully improved version of this chapter. I've been meaning to write out the middle three chapters for ages, but between writer's block and me just being an idiot over the whole thing, it hasn't happened yet. As it stands, I have a very distinct plan for the end of the story and a fairly clear idea for a sequel (which might throw Seamus into the fray), but I'm still sticking somewhere around the middle. I really wanted to rewrite this chapter not so much for plot but for style and characterization.

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Prologue

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Draco Malfoy sat down on the stairs and muttered to himself as he pulled off his shoes. Only two weeks home from school and he was already forced to skulk about the house- his house. He could see Potter having to do this sort of thing. Poor Potter, abused by muggles in the tragic household of his upbringing. Much as he despised Potter he almost felt sorry for him, stuck in that muggle house. Almost.

He picked up a shoe in each hand and crept quietly down a long corridor, the icy chill of the stone slipping between the threads in his socks. He paused at a closed door. His father, or what remained of him, had locked himself in there nearly a week ago and hadn't come out since. Mother never even checked on him anymore. She had always thought he was an idiot anyway. "It's all in good fun until someone gets thrown to the dementors," had always been a favorite aphorism around her. "Never send a Crabbe to be a lookout," was another. And though Draco had never been able to learn of the original incident that spurred it, he lived by it all the same.

Draco held his breath and peered into the keyhole. It was pointless really. The tiny glimpse of the mahogany desk was clouded almost entirely by the unfocused silver rim. He looked anyway, trying to tilt his head for a better perspective. The way he was nearly crawling up the wall with his arms braced around the door frame to get a better look might have been terribly funny to a passing house elf if it hadn't been for the large and quite heavy china teapot she was carrying. But what was even more comical was the way he flew backwards onto the floor when a rustling of papers combined with a yelp of pain that was most certainly not a house elf startled him out of his mind.

He recovered rapidly with as much dignity as could be expected when one has just back flipped onto one's face; but before he could leave quietly and quickly, so as to save his own skin, a slight twitch deep within him made him stay. His hand reached for the doorknob and turned. It wasn't locked at all.

Whether it was some tiny inkling of love for his father or just simple curiosity that made him turn the handle was of no consequence now. The door was wide open and he stared blankly as his father rolled up his shirtsleeve and looked anxiously at the black mark burning on his forearm. His pale hand reached up and pulled at his hair as though he might, by some miracle, find what he was looking for on their roots. 

Lucius Malfoy opened a wardrobe near the desk and pulled out a set of dark robes that he hurriedly pulled on over his shirt and trousers. He grabbed a handful of the papers on the desk. His eyes glanced over the top page and his face paled further. 

"Not nearly enough," he trailed off as he shoved the papers clumsily into a pocket on the robes.

Draco squirmed inside. He knew he shouldn't be seeing this, mostly because he didn't want to. He could creep away now and no one would be the wiser. His father hadn't even noticed him. But still-

"Father?" The elder Malfoy looked finally to the door and gave his son a wan smile before disappearing with a small pop that was magnified by the silence.

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"Tut-tut," sneered a cold voice as Lucius Malfoy reappeared in a fairly small room with a fire lit in the grate. It came from an armchair with a high back so that all he could see of the speaker was the claw-like hand gripping the chair. He moved quickly around to the front of the chair.

"Late again, Malfoy."

"Yes, my lord," muttered Malfoy. He stared down at the floor and tried to focus on the pattern on the carpet instead of the pain that would soon be making every inch of his flesh scream in pain. His mind strayed back to his years at Hogwarts when he had never understood why the Cruciatus curse was unforgivable. There were plenty of pain-inducing charms that were only treated as misdemeanors by the ministry. He hadn't understood why this one was any different. That is, he hadn't understood until-

"Crucio!" shrieked the creature in the chair. Lucius' thoughts were caught short as the breath was knocked out of him. He reeled to the floor, his skull colliding with the floor. The first time it had been worse- the first time he had vomited; the first time his eyes had burned with hot tears.

The thing -for it was not remotely human- in the chair cut off the curse with a laugh and stood above Lucius. He knew that it was all for effect. Voldemort treated each meeting like a theatrical performance with him as the evil and all mighty monarch and the deatheaters as his minions. They would have all thought it extremely childish if it weren't so dangerous to think such things. If he simply carried out the meetings by saying things like "You do this" and "You do that" and "You over there, get moving or I'll curse your feet off" it would all be so much more efficient. But then, the drama, the wholly dark and twisted nature of it all was what had first intrigued him as a snotty Slytherin fifth year with a fondness for tripping, or rather paying others to trip first years.

"I won't do it again, my lord," said Lucius as he crept to his feet.

"He said that the last time," squeaked a timid voice from the corner. Lucius cursed the sniveling bastard that was Wormtail in his mind.

"But, my lord," cut in Lucius, trying to keep the malice in his voice at a minimum, "I was merely late because I was trying to collect my calculations for your newest project."

"Ah, yes," said Voldemort as a smile crept onto his face. "The new one."

"Yes, my lord. The preliminary tests have shown questionable results. We haven't tried it yet on an actual human-"

"Why not?" asked Voldemort, his voice raising. Lucius braced himself for the curse, but it didn't come.

"The results could be devastating. It could simply corrupt the nervous system and cause a break down. It might simply ruin any hope for recruitment.

"I'm sure," began Voldemort as though the solution were incredibly obvious, "that you could find a suitable test subject."

"But-"

"I wouldn't think you would make things so difficult Lucius. I believe you have a son."

"Draco? But I couldn't." He really couldn't. Even if his own affections for the boy wavered at times, he was sure Narcissa's wouldn't, and her wrath was just about up to par with that of Voldemort.

"Than I suggest you find someone else rather quickly-" The hunched man in the corner took a step forward.

"My lord, may I suggest a suitable person?" he asked timidly. Lucius rolled his eyes, but Voldemort turned to him.

"Yes?"

"Percy Weasley, sir. He works in the ministry, so if the experiment is successful, he could be invaluable. His family is very involved with the workings of Dumbledore."

"And if not," continued Lucius with a grin, "then I'm sure that Arthur Weasley wouldn't mind one less brat to look after." He thought, for the briefest of moments, that perhaps Wormtail was not as worthless as originally supposed.

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	2. A Day In the Life

The Perseus Complex

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A/N: I've re-written this one too, though this is really the first version for those of you reading this on Fiction Alley. I just wanted to smooth over a few bits, add a bit more here and there, etc. This one is not as re-worked I think as the prologue, and all the important stuff isn't changed. Worded differently perhaps, but not changed. However, a minor mythological reference has been added. Please enjoy if you can, and I swear chapters 2, 3, and 4 will be out soon. They sort of need to be written and edited as a group. On top of that, I'm afraid of "messing up" this story just because I've had such high hopes for it. Anyway, here it is:

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Chapter 1- A Day In the Life

-Or-

Ganymede's Bain

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A shrill ring pierced the cold morning air, and Percy cursed himself for coming up with the brilliant idea of putting the alarm clock in the bathroom so he would have to get up to turn it off. He pulled a pillow over his ears and tried to ignore the alarm, but he gave up when it started shrieking: "Get up you lazy idiot!"

He trudged into the bathroom and threw the alarm into the toilet, not even bothering to check the time. It sputtered under the water for a moment before finally shutting down. It had been a joke at first -a gift from the twins- an alarm clock for Perfect Percy who was never late for anything. Perfect Percy would never need an alarm clock to be on time. The only problem was that Perfect Percy seemed to have drifted out of existence recently, leaving a tall young man who had suddenly realized how meaningless his life had become.

Voldemort was back. He had known it before he left home, before he had insisted on getting his own flat; but it hadn't even registered in his mind until he started to unpack a box of books and realized that if Voldemort attacked him, here in this room, the fact that he owned a first edition of "Prefects Who Gained Power" wouldn't even delay his death a moment. It wouldn't matter that he had been Head Boy at Hogwarts. It wouldn't matter that he'd had top grades. He didn't even bother saying "You-know-who" anymore. It just didn't matter. 

Percy stared at the blurred reflection in the chipped mirror over the sink and sighed. Two weeks on his own and his life was coming apart at the seams.

What was the use of going to work of going to work to write reports on import standards when a maniacal wizard was on the loose and preparing to make import regulations completely irrelevant?

But he had to go. Dad would know he hadn't been in to work; mum would worry. And both would come to his flat to check on him and find their son, their Perfect Percy, surrounded by dirty laundry with a hangover to boot.

He was still in his shirt and tie from last night, although the tie was now up over one ear. The shirt hung over his boxers, and he assumed, or rather hoped, that he had simply disapparated himself home last night and fallen asleep before he could take them off.

He tried to remember what had happened the previous night and was hit with a wave of nausea that made him automatically double up and turn to the toilet. He bent over it, bracing his arms on the side and waited for the vomit to come, but it didn't. There was nothing to vomit; he hadn't eaten in days. Stomach acid ran up his throat and washed back down, but that was the extent of the qualm.

A shaking hand was thrust into the icy water and pulled out the clock. Squinting so he could make out the glowing red numbers on the clock, he swore loudly. Not enough time to even take a shower. He rubbed the stubble on his chin. He should shave, but again, he didn't have time.

With one hand pulling the tie off of his head and the other desperately trying to comb his hair, he ran back into the bedroom. He grabbed the nearest pair of pants and pulled them on, feeding the tie through the belt loops as a makeshift belt. He fumbled for his glasses and jammed them on.

Sliding the messenger bag he carried his papers in over his shoulder, he burst out of the flat and into the hallway. He had to leave the building the muggle way so his neighbors didn't get suspicious. Not that they weren't already. The general opinion held by the other tenants was that he was a kind but definitely eccentric young man who always got a bit nervous when anyone asked him about his line of work. Of course, old Mrs. Nettle was sure that he was dealing in drugs, but then Mrs. Nettle was also convinced that Bernie the janitor was really the head of a vast spy network. No one paid her much attention.

He apparated to the ministry building from an alley. If he remembered correctly, he had a spare set of ministry robes in his office. If he didn't, well, it didn't really matter. He could apparate home now and get them since he'd already made his appearance of walking out of the building.

Home was a funny word now. The flat with all it's dirty laundry hardly felt like home, but neither did the Burrow anymore. It was over and done with as much as his dormitory at Hogwarts; but he could remember both so clearly it was painful, from the smoke that sporadically poured out from under the door to the twins' room to the corner of the dormitory that was always covered in quidditch banners tacked up in a precise and planned arrangement by Oliver at the start of every term.

The room felt strange somehow when he entered. An eagle stirred in the corner of his vision and was gone when he looked for it straight on through the lenses of his glasses. He went a drawer at the bottom of his desk. The robes were inside, but he never had a chance to put them on. Before he could even pick them up, the door creaked open. His heart thundered for a moment before he froze and fell to the floor, but not of his own accord. A levitation spell lifted the stunned body off the ground. Several dark figures now grabbed his body, but one paused for a moment and picked the boy's glasses off the floor with a shaking hand. They disapparated in unison. 

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"Is it ready yet?" sneered Lucius as he examined the body on the table. He still didn't see how this would work, but now he could always throw the blame onto Wormtail if necessary. 

"Almost," muttered Avery as he set up charms around the boy's wrists, ankles, and neck.

"Put one across the waist too."

"Yes, in a moment."

"What- what are those for?" asked Wormtail as he timidly approached the table like a beaten dog approaches its owner.

"Honestly," scoffed Lucius. "We have to bring him out of the stunning spell in order to start the test. That means that he's going to regain consciousness for several seconds. The charms, if Avery can set them properly, will hold him down until it knocks him out again."

"Done!" said Avery sharply. He stepped back from the table with his wand still pointing at the body.

"Enervate!" Lucius pointed his wand at the table.

Immediately the muscles tensed, the fists clenched. The dark blue eyes shot open and stared in shock at the three men standing over him. He struggled to move, but the spells held him down tight. The charm around his neck cut into his throat like coarse rope as he breathed.

"Why?" he whispered as his eyes ran over the men again. They ignored him, setting the complex charm into motion. He squinted, tried to make out their faces, tried to see where he was while he pulled at the charms on his wrists desperately.

But then the test began, and his body fell limp once more.


	3. Measured Out in Miles

The Perseus Complex

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A/N: I don't know if this is the longest fan fic chapter I've written, but it seems like it. I apologize to everyone who has been waiting for this chapter. Here it is, not exactly how I meant it be but here all the same. It's far choppier than I intended, and it doesn't exactly accomplish what I set out to do. However, I felt it had already been unfairly long between chapters so I decided to post it anyway. Comments, suggestions, etc. are appreciated as always.

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Chapter 2- Measured Out in Miles

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"It's set for now. We won't have to go in until later." Lucius Malfoy made one last check on the restraining charms and then crossed the room to an armchair.

"Go-" Wormtail's voice halted for a moment, "-in?"

"Not you," said Lucius firmly. "You're staying here to watch the restraints."

"But why do they need to be watched anyway? You've checked them nearly a dozen times." Avery's tone carried a hint of ridicule that he hadn't bothered to hide. Unlike Wormtail he knew that Lucius wasn't about to curse anyone. The way his right foot bounced nervously as he sat was more than enough proof of that.

"Because he's not stunned. He can still move, and he just might once we go in."

"All right then. Whatever you say." The sarcasm was stronger now, and Avery finished of with a salute in Lucius' direction that was missed by his darting eyes.

"We just have to let it run its course for now." Lucius wrung his hands and trailed off; oblivious to the way Avery was snickering as he prodded the fire with a poker.

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First there was nothing, but then colors whirled before his eyes, spinning and melting into each other. He dropped to his knees and crawled over the ground, reaching out for the familiar horn-rimmed lenses. The colors slowed, forming shapes that were smeared and imposing. He squinted so his eyes were two thin slits, but the scenery remained blurred and unclear. Then voices that were almost familiar to him seemed to float out of the colors. His eyes relaxed and widened, but his ears strained desperately.

"Look at him on the ground like that."

"Must be mad."

"You're mad."

"You are too then."

"But he's not."

"What is he then, if he's not mad?"

"He's Percy."

"I see your point. What are you doing down there, Percy?"

"My glasses- I can't see." He turned to the voices, but they seemed to change position almost immediately. Suddenly they were behind him and closer than before.

"He is mad."

"I told you."

"My glasses-"

"They're right there on your face."

"How are they on my face if I can't see?" The whole sentence spurted out like a tired sigh.

"Perhaps if you opened your eyes?"

"Usually works for me."

He clenched his teeth. As he was preparing to explain that his eyes were already open, his hand went up out of habit to adjust his glasses. He meant to stop his hand because there was nothing there -he was sure he did- but somehow the hand continued of it's own accord until it reached the corner of the frames that weren't there and moved them slightly. His hands went to his eyes immediately, finding them behind the lenses. And they were closed.

"But-" He opened them slowly and fell back in surprise as two faces came into focus, both peering down like children examining a funny colored caterpillar that's inching it's way over one of dad's prize tomatoes.

"There you go! Much better with them open?" The faces pulled backwards and exchanged a playful smile.

"Er, yes." His ears were tinged just slightly with pink as he picked himself up from the ground. He looked, or rather looked up to the faces and found them more than almost familiar. "What are you two doing in bowler hats and suits?!"

"We think we look quite dashing," said George with a sideways sort of grin.

"And there's also the spectacular opportunity to do this now." Fred looked to George and then they both flicked off their hats and replaced them with a complicated series of flips and turns that might have been more impressive to Percy if he hadn't been so confused.

"Yes, but how then?"

"It's your fault really."

"Truly tragic."

"We told you all those muggle books would spoil your brain when you had us packing them to move."

"If only you'd listened." George pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at the corners of his eyes.

"It's your doing in any case."

Percy paused, and for a moment he meant to ask them what they meant, but a sudden realization derailed that train of thought. "You're taller!"

"What do you mean?" Fred asked, the smile slipping off his face.

"I've always been taller than you two, but now you're up higher than me."

"Oh, that." They both looked relieved. "Maybe it's you that's grown shorter."

"People don't grow shorter."

"Not people. Just you."

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"You're no fun anymore," muttered Avery as he shot a glance at Lucius that started off like a speeding bullet but ended something like a slight breeze. There was something about his eyes (or perhaps just him) that caused his malice to loose energy at an exponential rate to distance. Not that he was any less annoyed; the force just petered out two yards short of its target. 

He jabbed the fire with the poker. He could almost imagine Lucius' face amid the tumbling flames, the iron spear sliding neatly through the forehead. He pulled it back slowly, letting the flesh splinter ever so gently. And then, when it was free once more, he pulled his arm back and then thrust it forward. The tip plunged into one eye, then the next. But then the blow loosened a bit of the left ear, and the flaming ember flew across the room, landing squarely onto a pile of papers. The face abandoned the logs and Avery who was too busy putting back the poker to notice.

"It's on fire!" shrieked Wormtail. Flames were engulfing the pages of calculations that became progressively untidier as the fire continued down as though the numbers had finally caught on and were trying to escape.

"Eh?" Avery turned to the scene with practiced nonchalance. He now stood as far from the fire as could be managed; the poker, meanwhile, swung in its holder like a doom-ridden pendulum.

"You idiots!" yelled Lucius as he pointed his wand onto the fire. Water splashed up on the other two, the result of intentionally poor aim. He crossed the room and dragged Avery's robes, with Avery inside, to the table where the test subject lay.

"What did /I/ do?" Avery straightened his robes indignantly.

"Shut up. I can tell by looking at you that you did it." 

"What are you playing at? I haven't done anything." He nodded his head in the direction of Wormtail. "Look at him. See how guilty /he/ looks?"

"I might have believed you if it hadn't been for the fact that you've been an ass all morning."

"Me? You're the one who's been sitting there waiting to wet your pants since we got here."

"Don't say another word."

"And what's he here for anyway?" He gestured to Wormtail again. "Anyone could send us in and watch the boy."

"I have my reasons," said Lucius. He glanced at Wormtail. The nervous man was trying to salvage the paperwork. Then, in a whisper, "He was the boy's pet for nine years. The settings are based on his information. If something goes wrong and he's here watching on top of it all, we won't even miss our supper. He, on the other hand...." The corners of Lucius' mouth twitched and then crawled up in search of his eyes. True malice glinted off his smile and found itself reflected in Avery's own curving mouth. 

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Percy was perhaps the last in his family to really know his Uncle Bilius; he had died somewhat mysteriously only a few months before the night that made Harry Potter famous when the twins were only three and Ron had just turned a year. What memories hid did have, though, were obscured. Other, more permanent fixtures in his life had changed, at least in his perspective, as he had. Trees had slowly grown smaller, many books had grown less enigmatic, and people who had once been too amazing to be believed had grown to be more tangible and real. But Bilius, or rather what Percy remembered of him, was always distorted with a five-year-old's vision. And it was his vision that made it all the more strange.

Bilius' funeral had fallen on a wet, unpleasant day as many funerals do. That evening, mud had somehow appeared deep in the crevasses of George's left ear. Somewhere along the way it had also managed to suck the shoes off of both twins so that they ran screaming over a hill in only their socks. Percy had been left to hold Ron's hand then. It had often been like that, though Bill and Charlie were never there to chase down the twins as they had been on that day.

None of them were sure what had happened next, mostly because none had been watching. Here Percy's sharp memory became warped; every image unfocused and smeared into the next. The wet chill alone had remained as his stomach reeled worse than it had when Charlie had taken him out for "flying lessons." Something was wrong that he had to fix- something that no one else could see. His mind ached with seasickness, but he had to stop it. Every fiber of his body had ached as he tried to do something, anything at all.

Someone had cried out, a woman he had never heard before, and Percy had hit the ground with a thud that stopped all the spinning. Ron was startled; his fussing turned to a constant wail. Percy had tripped without moving, fallen without leaving the ground it seemed. And then there was the glowing green flash, half-obscured in the sky by the rain and wind.

No one remembered it like he had. He had fallen in the mud. Ron had cried. The twins had been caught. And they all were taken home to have warm baths. Ron had been the only one to scream. No one else ever said anything about the green light that Percy knew had seared through the rain.

When Percy was found to have a reasonably serious vision impairment several weeks later, it was assumed by all (including Percy) that the problem had always existed and that it was only brought to attention then because he was just beginning to read at that time. His gradual progression into poorer eyesight had always been attributed, in part, to his bookishness and the strain his constant reading put on his eyes. There was no reason for them to believe otherwise. Or rather, there was no reason that could possibly be considered, even in a family immersed in the bizarrities of the magical world.

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	4. Measured Out in Years

_­Child-like, no-one understands,_

_Jack-knife in your sweaty hands._

_Some kind of innocence is measured out in years,_

_You don't know what it's like to listen to your fears__._

-"Hey Bulldog"

John Lennon and Paul McCartney

3

Ron had been trying to read the page in the textbook for the third time when Ginny knocked on his door.

Mad-Eye Moody (the real one, that is) had, in his final and only moments as a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, managed to assign what was promising to be a very unpleasant essay for summer schoolwork. Ron's much neglected responsible side had thought it might be a good idea to get a head start. The other more fainéant side had been too bored to protest.

The assignment was "to discuss one of the three unforgivable curses, considering its development, purpose, uses, and limitations." He was almost interested until, of course, he noticed the part that read: "Must be at least two feet in length." 

"The Imperius curse," he began to read out loud, "is one of the most useful and yet restrictive dark curses yet developed. The caster, in a successful attempt, gains complete control over the voluntary movements of the victim. (Involuntary actions, such as respiration and circulation, continue as normal unless affected by a voluntary act.) The curse can be resisted, however, and thus loses some versatility. 

"The greatest limitation on its use is ironically the complete loss of free will on the part of the victim. The victim must be monitored constantly and accurately as an unexpected variable could easily lead to suspicion. Uncharacteristic behavior is another common fault of the curse. Many trials following the reign of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named used such behavior as evidence in defense of those accused of illegal activity.

"It is believed, though unconfirmed, that the dark wizard Grindlewald was attempting to develop a more practical control spell prior to his defeat in 1945. The only records of any such activity disappeared decades ago, shrouding the event in mystery…." 

The text went of for several pages more, but Ron's engagement had waned. And when he finally finished complaining about the sheer injustice of it all, he had forgotten it entirely and had to start back at the beginning. Ginny interrupted him just as he reached "the complete loss of free will" for the third and final time.

"'M busy."

"It's important."

"No, it's not."

"I'm serious."

"What is it then?" Ron crossed the room and opened to door. Ginny's face stood out deathly pale amid the long, brilliantly-colored hair.

"It's Percy."

"Percy what?" Ron groaned. "Have the twins poisoned him yet?"

"No." She looked frantic. "They're at Lee's, remember? Come look. Quick." She grabbed his wrist and dragged him down the stairs. If she had let go for a moment Ron would have scrambled back up the stairs. Somewhere in the back of his mind was a tiny twin-driven voice yelling advice like "run when she isn't looking," but she knew him too well.

They arrived, Ginny's knuckles white as she clenched Ron's bony arm. 

And they were standing in front of the family clock.

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Sick. He felt sick. Not ill. Sick. Ill was a stomach ache after too much potatoe salad or a headache after one of the twins' pranks. Sick was this, this twisted, horribly wrong feeling without a source that made him wish for death. But was he even alive? He couldn't remember. Something was wrong, vaguely yet horrifyingly wrong as he plodded after, who were they? His brothers? But they weren't at all though. Was this melting place hell, his punishment? Or only a warning like in that muggle book? What muggle? He stumbled on air and fell, searching for something, anything at all familiar.

"What is it now?"

"He's fallen."

"Oh, hell, Percy, don't be a prat."

His lips trembled. Something slid between them and he reached out to catch it.

"What was that?"

"Dantay, he said."

"Oh. What's dantay, Perce?"

He heard the voices, his own even, answering distantly, and his body slowly convulsed and contracted, closing in on itself, reaching in for the comfort and oblivion that wasn't there, dying.

Something was wrong, and yet it all seemed exactly right at the same time, off-kilter but in perfect rhythm. Things he knew couldn't be enveloped him in a sickly haze. He tried desperately to think, to reason, but the mustard-colored fog filled his lungs and blotted out his thoughts.

But no, it wasn't fog at all but water, almost viscous with salt and bile. Everything in his mind was dulled but for the instinctual drive to reach the light and air waiting for him at the surface. It was there, taunting him; he could see the sun glancing off the water while the air whispered in his ears. He struggled hopelessly, and his muscles screamed in his mind when his mouth wouldn't open. 

The pain numbed his thoughts. He would die now, surely. But what was death even? If he went limp, if he just left himself to the pain, would he die faster? Would it come easier? If only, if only. Head spinning. Colors- green? No, orange. Sick, sick. Home? Mum. Da. Good boy, good boy. Don't cry. Hush, hush. Must be good, good boy. Air? No. Move now, yes, yes. Breathe, good boy. Try, good boy. Step. Light. Close. Closer. Good, good. Almost. Not gone, not gone yet. Mummy, mum, wet and sticky. Almost home. Home. Home. All the way home.

And just for a moment, he broke free.

For a hair-thin fraction, it was all there. He was Percy. He was real. He remembered. 

He fell.

~~~~~

How many times had he seen this before? It was all so familiar, the red hair defiantly stretching out in every direction, the expression not so much blank as solemn. As he watched, the chest began to heave under the restraints.

Wormtail stood across the room from the body, white with death but writhing, turning.

And then it stopped. 

He turned to glance at the others. Lucius was still salvaging his notes. Avery stood at a bookcase moodily setting curses on each book. Both were occupied.

He was cornered, trapped inside his mind with only one way out; a few desperate tears welled up around his eyes with nowhere to go. Something caught Wormtail's eye at that moment, and he walked to the table where the body lay as though compelled. Somewhere inside of him there was a slight twinge, and some part of him- perhaps the part that had once been called Peter- felt sorry for someone else for the first time in many years. Suddenly he was reminded of a small boy with glasses too large for his face that brought him bits of food and told him all the things that he wanted to do and be. So Peter, as he happened to be at that moment, took one last look at the glasses, which by then did fit much better, and pulled out his wand to do something he would later try to desperately explain as being the fault of Crabbe or the like.

He was gone, mad in his brain. What would loosening a few things do? Peter nudged the ties around the boy's wrists with his wand. Just a little looser. Just a bit. He looked at the flesh under the bindings, red and raw, burned with the pulling. But he was still now. What could it hurt?

He stood back, and found something inside him other than guilt. But as he cast around his mind for what it was called (he had known it before), the boy began to turn, slowly at first, but then faster, more violently. The table rumbled with desperation and fear, and then....

Peter gazed in horror as two pale blue eyes burned brightly in the empty room. There was a gasp for breath. And the eyes were gone.

He glanced around desperately. Had the others seen? But they hadn't. They had remained, as always, absorbed in their own private business. He needn't mention a thing.

Finally, Lucius found what he sought. His pale hand plucked the paper from the table and held it at arm's length. It still dripped, and an internalized respect for finely tailored clothing kept it from the spilt India ink that had been captured in his flowing robes.

"Avery. Come. I've found it."

Avery's lip curled at the now recovered superiority of his tone, but he said nothing. There was nothing he might say.

The prepared spells were activated carefully and delicately, Lucius doing most of the work, but Avery, caught in an unintentional rhythem, doing small bits where he might. Wormtail looked on sulkily.

Soon they were finished, and the two sat down in the chairs that had been prepared with the spells. Lucius reclined the back of his slighty, but Avery, in defiance or simple ignorance of the gesture, declined to do so. The final words were whispered and they were gone from their bodies as much as the boy was from his. What Was Avery slumped forward, the spine stretching suddenly as the face hung down towards a slowly rising chest.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly so, a smile slid across the other's face, turning the corners of lips that were thin and pale towards eyes that that were closed with a magical sleep and fair hair that curved around a sharply cut jaw.

~~~~~

He had stared at clock for what felt like an eternity when she put her hand on his shoulder. But he couldn't look away. Not then. He stood there, willing the hand to move. But it didn't. He should have said something. He should have tried harder. He should have listened. But he didn't. He let him slip away. And why? Because they disagreed over stupid things? Because he had been mean to mum? Because they had both said things they hadn't meant? Because they were idiots really.

The letter, that last letter, between all the anger there had been concern. He did care. Somewhere. Why hadn't he noticed? He wasn't really a prat. Not really. He was his older brother. Hadn't he always looked out for him at school? So why did he let him die?

Arthur Weasley sighed and leaned back in his chair, weary with the memory of a brother that had died, whose name was carried by Arthur's own son. That day, that day. The hand had finally moved, but it wouldn't stop anywhere. It just spun and spun, searching for the place that wasn't there. He hadn't thought, when he had built the clock for a special seventh year assignment, that looking into its face would ever sicken him. But it did.

He couldn't think why he had remembered it all so suddenly. No idea at all.

~~~~~

"Gin," Ron began slowly with the long, exasperated breath that was his trademark and a meaningful look at the arm she was clinging to. "Let g-"

"Shut up and look!" She let go only long enough to cuff him on the back of the head. She knew him too well.

His gestures were slightly exaggerated for a moment with moody sarcasm as he turned his gaze to the clock. He was concerned, of course. Ginny rarely fussed so, but he was still wary of the possibility that maybe Fred and George had rubbed off on her too. But when he finally looked, finally focused his eyes, it was the sort of eyes-wide, mouth-dropped look that never looks quite sincere that flooded Ron's pale, freckled face.

~~~~~

It was as though a giant eraser was scraping him away. Realization suddenly faded into wispy memories. He had known, he had seen, but all he knew now was that there had been something there before. He searched his mind, and he felt like he had walked into a room and found that it had been changed when he wasn't looking. Only he couldn't quite pinpoint what it was that was gone. His mind was slipping through his hands like water, and there was nothing he could do. The futility was sickening, but there was nothing left in him to vomit.

He bobbed up and down on the waves. The sun hit him hard and then bounced back up from the water with a cruel uppercut. He wanted to drown but found he couldn't. Sinking is the kind of thing that's very easy to do until you want to. Even when he swam down as far as he could, he still floated back to the surface before he could suffocate. Thus, he resigned himself to floating corpse-like on the surface while the light rang behind his eyes even though they were shut.

He was pretending not to exist and enjoying it most thoroughly when something made him very indignant. But then, being prodded with a stick is enough to make anyone indignant.

~~~~~

A/N: Sort of a lighter note to end on…not really light though I guess. More twisted and sarcastic. Anyway, I wanted to get this up before Christmas, and I cropped the Ginny-Ron storyline a little shorter in the chapter than I meant to. I also did revised versions of the previous chapters, but all that really means is that I put the song lyrics the titles are borrowed from at the beginning and moved my horrible author's notes to the end. Tried to make it more aesthetically pleasing and all. As you can now probably see more clearly, this whole story has a sort of Beatles theme to it. I think the sequel, if I ever write it, will go more in a Radiohead direction. Still sticking with Brits though. This chapter is dedicated to Arielle, whose kind reviews gave me the motivation not to just scrap the whole thing, even though I did take my damn sweet time getting around to writing this chapter. Sorry. I keep meaning to make these shorter, but I always feel a need to explain my ineptitude


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